Success Story Of Brucira Co-founders & CEO Siddhita Upare & Harsh Vijay

Please introduce your Startup and give a brief about yourself.

Brucira is a design firm that helps Indian & Global businesses launch new projects and solve business challenges with intelligent & neat design. 

We are a team of passionate UX/UI designers, product managers, full stack developers and communication artists. 

Hi, my name is Siddhita, I founded Brucira along with Harsh in 2018. We are a bootstrapped yet profitable startup working with high growth businesses such as Google, DHL, HotStar, Google,  Titan-EyePlus to name a few. 

How can you describe your Startup?

At Brucira, when we started, the idea was to work on a combination of Product design and illustrations. During our journey we explored ways how we could merge these two different domains and create beautiful experiences for the users.

Most of the agencies in India currently are focused on finishing projects. While at Brucira, being from product background we understand the involvement required of a designer at each level of product development. We rely mostly on data whenever we do a revamp and take complete ownership of the project. This lacks in majority of the agencies currently and this is where the real value lies.

What were you doing before?

I had an inclination towards design from a very early age. I am a 2015 batch graduate from JJ Institute of Applied Arts, Mumbai.

I started my journey as an illustrator at Housing.com. For Housing as a brand, design was a means to stand distinct in the crowded brokerage world. We explored different forms of communication via design. I also met my Co-founder at Housing. Post that I joined an ad agency names ting and worked there for around 2 years. My last job before Brucira was as a UI/UX Designer in Turtlemint.

What is your inspiration behind your Startup?

The idea right from the start has been to work alongside businesses to find business solutions with neat & intelligent design. This inspires us every single day.

When it comes to brand ideology and communication we look up to Apple & Nike. Both the brands have been cristal clear right from the beginning in terms of their values. 

Describe Your Startup Name, Why you are using this Name?

Brucira coins its name from two words ‘Brew’ and ‘Cira’. While ‘brew’ represents a process of building up, ‘cira’ is a Greek word meaning ‘Sun’-the epitome of eternity & power. Voila! that’s Brucira.

What was the idea behind starting Startup?

We started as a combination of Product design and illustrations and found ways how we can merge these two different domains and create beautiful experiences for the users. Being from product background we understand the involvement required of a designer at each level of product development. We rely mostly on data whenever we do a revamp and take complete ownership of the project. This lacks in majority of the agencies currently and this is where the real value lies.

What are the services you offer to your clients?

We are currently offering 12 services including UI, UX, Illustrations, Design testing, Brand & Communication Strategy, to name of few. Most of our clients however join hands with us for full-fledged product launches : that include ideation to launch including user testing.

What are the factors which influenced you to start the company?

One of the main factors was the prevalent gap in the industry. The time we started there were only a handful of companies/agencies for freelancers who could do justice to both experience and creative part of the product. Harsh & I, found our skill set complementing each other and we saw the potential that gave birth to the idea.

How did your journey start towards your startup from planning to funding?

We spent 3 months preparing the portfolio. The idea was to give the prospects the closest representation to what we do. While my strength has been illustrations and b that covered few important services we offer. We did a few projects before but those were not in presentable form. For 3 months straight we just worked on improving our previous work and also our skills. We actually prepared next 4 month planning for social media and how we can run campaigns in order to gain traction. I Think funding is never in our planning. We learned to take risks without having any backing. We took decisions that we made right by working hard. Funds sometimes makes you casual with your decisions and we don’t want to get into that direction.

What your stack on the competition? who are your competitors? How you are overcoming them?

There are design agencies that have been there as long as since last 2-3 decades, especially in Mumbai. However we do not see any parallel competition in India, since we are a product first design company that follows project management agile methodology.
The scope of Design in India is changing, infact the most of UX & UI branch of design developed only in the last 5 years and we get the advantage of being early players in the space.

The biggest advantage we have is that we are young and trusted. While we do learn from the old conventions of design, we do not restrict ourselves. We focus on keeping our minds open and explore possibilities of great user experience and brand presence creation.

We think fresh and take risks.

Is the Startup growing at good phase according to your plans? What are the upcoming plans from your end?

The team is expanding really fast. We recruited 15 members in last 8 months. The business increased by 400% from last financial year. We recently inaugurated our second office without any external support and at the same time keeping security for our employees.

We feels limited when it comes to work with startups from bangalore and hyderabad. Clients are comfortable working with agencies located in the same city so the plan is to expand brucira in bangalore and then hyderabad in the coming years. 

We are also expanding with domains ad added development and marketing as new divisions.

I think everyone has some inspiring person in their life and some taglines? who are they, what is their role in your Startup life?

I don’t have a particular person in mind however I used to admire chumbak a lot when I was in my school days. I always wanted to work

in chumbak somehow couldn’t get the opportunity. I worked towards that direction and tried to improve my skills for the same ad that is something helped me a lot in brucira as well. We at brucira also try to come up with something different just like chumbak we also want to create our own unique identity.

What is your experience as an Entrepreneur?

The experience could’t be expressed in words. You have to go through it in order to appreciate the beauty of it. Apart from business side, I have improved as a person a lot. I have started taking things seriously and respect the power of good relationships. It’s a 24 hour job but the end result is more than satisfactory. 

Where do you see yourself in 5 years?

Brucira should be a synonym of quality 5 years from now and that’s our goal. We want to be the best design agency in India in the next 2 years among the best in 5 years. I know it’s tough but with our current growth rate its achievable. We want to work with clients like Apple, Tesla, Facebook and want to create a unique identity in the market that people can easily differentiate our designs our products from the crowd.

What do you suggest people who are interested in starting their own business??

Don’t run after funding or developing ideas to get funded. Learn to create good business than good presentation :P . Give everything you got to make your dream success and keep on doing hard work even when you see no hopes and eventually you will succeed .